Currently 14,400 sq ft, including a full metal shop, wood shop, electronics (PCB engraver), plastics & fabric, and workstations. “Garages” for parking member carts for storage. Over 3,000 sq ft of office & fabrication space rented to start-ups and small businesses. We are a triple bottom line company: people, planet, profit. We even run a 5-day bootcamp on how to operate a makerspace, which draws from all over the country.

The next items we are looking to add are powder coating oven and a gas-fired forge.

What’s the craziest, most exciting, and/or most innovating project your group or group members have completed?

The Great Maker Race, a no-rules race we run at Maker Faires and other events. Attendees use custom-built hot-wire foam cutters to shape cars, then attach wheels and race them down a hilly track. We’ve had kids builds thousands of these cars. Arduino-based timer uses piezo film sensors for finish gate.

Do you have any events or initiatives you’d like to tell us about? Where can we learn more about it?

Each month we have “Fix-It Friday”. The general public is invited to bring in things as a last-chance to get them fixed. We’ve repaired many lamps, chairs, and a fair amount of consumer electronics. Monthly geek show and tell meeting called GO-Tech meets here (going since 2007): https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/notbago/info. Lots of great electronics, CNC, basic physics, historical technology, etc.

Can you tell us about some of your group’s recent tech projects?

About 4 FIRST robotics teams use Maker Works as their build location, so we always have interesting robotics going on. Other members design their own controllers for RC helicopters. The shop is working on a third generation of an RFID system for monitoring tool usage (ESP8266). Many projects shown on our Facebook page.

Show us your hackerspace! Tell us about your group! Submit here. Where does your group design, hack, create, program, debug, and innovate? Do you work in a 20′ × 20′ space in an old warehouse? Do you share a small space in a university lab? Do you meet at a local coffee shop or bar? What sort of electronics projects do you work on? Submit today.

We work with PIC, Arduino, and Raspberry Pi, and many more.
In fact one of our recent projects was a DIY PIC Programmer.

Can you tell us about some of your group’s recent tech projects?

One of the group’s first tech projects was the “MAME,” a full-size gaming arcade. The project was going well until there was a break in at the location and they lost some equipment; the MAME was put on the backburner. After they moved to their new location and gained a new member, an art teacher named John, the project garnered interest again. He came up with the design for it. Afterwords it was painted, they got a coin mechanism, speakers were hooked up, and the software was installed and configured. IT was finally finished.

Show us your hackerspace! Tell us about your group! Where does your group design, hack, create, program, debug, and innovate? Do you work in a 20′ × 20′ space in an old warehouse? Do you share a small space in a university lab? Do you meet at a local coffee shop or bar? What sort of electronics projects do you work on? Submit your hackerspace and we might feature you on our website!

Our workshop is over 6,500 square feet and we also have an office space.

What tools do you have in your space?

Electronics

PCB board design

Robotics

Soldering stations

Woodworking shop

Metalworking shop

Welding shop

Rapid Prototyping

Lab (CNC, Lastercutter, 3D Printers)

Brewery & Distillery

Jewelry

Datacenter

And many more…

Are there any tools your group really wants or needs?

Any PCB and pick/play stuff. Also some electronics supplies would be nice.

Does your group work with embedded tech like Arduino, Raspberry Pi, embedded security, or MCU-based designs?

We work with Arduino and Raspberry Pi a lot. Embedded stuff comes along quite often. For example we also work with Nvidia’s Jetson TK1 board, oDroid boards, and Parallella boards.

What are some of the projects your group has been working on?

We just did the Denver Mini Maker Faire. We also built a Tesla coil and we have about a dozen of other projects, which you can all find on our website.

What’s the craziest project your group or group members have completed?

For our craziest project so far I must say it was the 15 foot human-powered Ferris wheel. This was a great project!

What would you like to say to fellow hackers out there?

Come on down and BUILD something with us!

Want to know more about TinkerMill? Make sure to check out their website!

Show us your hackerspace! Tell us about your group! Where does your group design, hack, create, program, debug, and innovate? Do you work in a 20′ × 20′ space in an old warehouse? Do you share a small space in a university lab? Do you meet at a local coffee shop or bar? What sort of electronics projects do you work on? Submit your hackerspace and we might feature you on our website!

HackRVA is a Richmond-based makerspace. They like to take things apart, put them back together, figure out how they work, and create new things. Their mission? To learn and make stuff sharing tools and knowledge in technology; including Arduino, Makerbot, Linux, and the Open Source movement.

Our space is about 2,000 square feet. We have an AV and general meeting area, a tech lab, and a fab lab.

What’s in your “toolbox”?

Two 3D printers

Laser cutter

Lots of soldering stations

O-scopes

Hand and power tools

A computer lab

Are there any tools your group really wants or needs?

A CNC Router — like a shopbot. Can’t wait to build that first wiki-house!

Arduino, Raspberry Pi, embedded security… which embedded technologies does your group work with most frequently?

We use all that stuff. Arduino, R-Pi, whatever we can get our hands on! We’ve designed, from scratch, PCB Badges for RichSec security conference the last three years. Click here to learn more about the PCB Badges project.

What have you been working on lately?

For the past three years, we’ve designed those PCB badges for the RichSec security conference. Here’s another recent build where a member took a Power Wheels and made it Xbox controller driven. Check out the video below or click here to read more about that project.

Do you have any events or initiatives you’d like to tell us about? Where can we learn more about them?

You can learn more about us at hackrva.org. We host the Richmond Maker Guild, have regular Saturday Hackathons, as well as a Noise Night. Members are always coming up with creative events!

Any words of advice for fellow hackers?

My personal motto is fail often, teach others, and post to the web. All those things help me learn and think about projects better.

Want to know more about what HackRVA does? Check out their Facebook page and website.

Show us your hackerspace! Tell us about your group! Where does your group design, hack, create, program, debug, and innovate? Do you work in a 20′ × 20′ space in an old warehouse? Do you share a small space in a university lab? Do you meet a local coffee shop or bar? What sort of electronics projects do you work on? Submit your hackerspace and we might feature you on our website!

Orlando, FL-based web app developer and blogger Shea Silverman recently received Kickstarter funding for the latest version of PiPlay, his Raspberry Pi-based OS. Shea and I discussed his ongoing projects, his Raspberry Pi book, and what’s next for PiPlay.—Nan Price, Associate Editor

Shea Silverman

NAN: What is your current occupation?

SHEA: Web applications developer with the Center for Distributed Learning at the University of Central Florida (UCF).

SHEA: I’ve been blogging on and off for years, but I could never keep to a schedule or really commit myself to writing. After I started working on side projects, I realized I needed a place to store tips and tricks I had figured out. I installed WordPress, posted some PhoneGap tips, and within a day got a comment from someone who had the same issue, and my tips helped them out. I have been blogging ever since. I make sure to post every Friday night.

NAN: Tell us about PiPlay, the Raspberry Pi OS. Why did you start the OS? What new developments, if any, are you working on?

SHEA: PiPlay is a gaming and emulation distribution for the Raspberry Pi single-board computer. It is built on top of the Raspbian OS, and tries to make it as easy as possible to play games on your Raspberry Pi. My blog got really popular after I started posting binaries and tutorials on how to compile different emulators to the Raspberry Pi, but I kept getting asked the same questions and saw users struggling with the same consistent issues.

I decided I would release a disk image with everything preconfigured and ready to be loaded onto an SD card. I’ve been adding new emulators, games, and tools to it ever since.

I just recently completed a Kickstarter that is funding the next release, which includes a much nicer front end, a web GUI, and a better controller configuration system.

NAN: You wrote Instant Raspberry Pi Gaming. Do you consider this book introductory or is it written for the more experienced engineer?

SHEA: Instant Raspberry Pi Gaming is written like a cookbook with recipes for doing various tasks. Some of them are very simple, and they build up to some more advanced recipes. One of the easier tasks is creating your user account on the Pi Store, while the more advanced recipes have you working with Python and using an API to interact with Minecraft.

Readers will learn how to setup a Raspberry Pi, install and use various emulators and games, a bit about the Minecraft API, and common troubleshooting tips.

The Pitroller is a joystick and buttons hooked up to the GPIO pins of a Raspberry Pi, which can act as a controller or keyboard for various emulators.

NAN: You are a member of FamiLAB, an Orlando, FL-based community lab/hackerspace. What types of projects have you worked on at the lab?

Disney director Rich Moore poses with Shea’s miniature arcade machine. The machine was based on Fix It Felix Jr. from Disney’s Wreck It Ralph.

SHEA: I spend a lot of time at the lab using the laser cutter. Creating a 2-D vector in Inkscape, and then watching it be cut out on a piece of wood or acrylic is really inspiring. My favorite project was making a little arcade machine featuring Fix It Felix Jr. from Wreck It Ralph. A marketing person from Disney was able to get it into the hands of the director Rich Moore. He sent me a bunch of pictures of himself holding my little arcade machine next to the full size version.

NAN: Give us a little background information. How did you become interested in technology?

SHEA: My mom always likes to remind me that I’ve been using computers since I was 2. My parents were very interested in technology and encouraged my curiosity when it came to computers. I always liked to take something apart and see how it worked, and then try to put it back together. As the years went on, I’ve devoted more and more time to making technology a major part of my life.

NAN: Tell us about the first embedded system you designed.

SHEA: I have a lot of designs, but I don’t think I’ve ever finished one. I’ll be halfway into a project, learn about something new, then cannibalize what I was working on and repurpose it for my new idea. One of the first embedded projects I worked on was a paintball board made out of a PICAXE microcontroller. I never got it small enough to fit inside the paintball marker, but it was really cool to see everything in action. The best part was when I finally had that “ah-ha!” moment, and everything I was learning finally clicked.

NAN: What was the last electronics-design related product you purchased and what type of project did you use it with?

SHEA: At UCF, one of our teams utilizes a ticket system for dealing with requests. Our department does a hack day each semester, so my coworker and I decided to rig up a system that changes the color of the lights in the office depending on the urgency of requests in the box. We coded up an API and had a Raspberry Pi ping the API every few minutes for updates. We then hooked up two Arduinos to the Raspberry Pi and color-changing LED strips to the Arduinos. We set it up and it’s been working for the past year and a half, alerting the team with different colors when there is work to do.

NAN: Are you currently working on or planning any projects?

SHEA: My Kickstarter for PiPlay just finished at 400% funding. So right now I’m busy working on fulfilling the rewards, and writing the latest version of PiPlay.

NAN: What do you consider to be the “next big thing” in the industry?

SHEA: Wearable computing. Google Glass, the Pebble smart watch, Galaxy Gear—I think these are all great indicators of where our technology is heading. We currently have very powerful computers in our pockets with all kinds of sensors and gadgets built in, but very limited ways to physically interact with them (via the screen, or a keypad). If we can make the input devices modular, be it your watch, a heads-up display, or something else, I think that is going to spark a new revolution in user experiences.

Quinn Dunki is more than just a hacker. This Los Angeles, CA-based embedded applications consultant and software game developer enjoys working on her homebrew 8-bit computer and dreams of a future filled with hackerspace-type libraries.—Nan Price, Associate Editor

QUINN: I had been in the AAA games industry for most of my career. I’ve been making games in my spare time since I was six years old, but the “actually-getting-paid-for-it” time started in the 1990s with the Nintendo 64.

I’ve written games on everything from the Apple II to the Playstation 3. I worked at various companies including Bungie Studios and 3DO.

My longest stint was eight good years at a small studio called Pandemic in Los Angeles, CA. In 2009, the company was in financial trouble and was sold to Electronic Arts with the intention it would keep it going. Electronic Arts opted to close the studio down shortly thereafter. We got some severance with our walking papers, and I decided to spin that money into One Girl, One Laptop Productions

This was just at the tail end of the initial gold rush on Apple’s iOS platform, and it still seemed like there was money to be made there. Unfortunately, there was subsequently a mad rush to the bottom on pricing for iPhone games. Before I could establish a presence, the space got very crowded almost overnight. Low-volume, high-quality indie games became financially unviable (though I think they’re coming back now). I still do independent game development on the side, but my primary business now is consulting and hired-gun engineering for other companies needing mobile or embedded applications.

Quinn has two workspaces. She uses this one for the “small clean stuff.”

Quinn’s other workspace is used for the “big dirty stuff.”

NAN: Describe some of the software One Girl, One Laptop Productions develops. Do you have a favorite?

QUINN: As much as I love games, my true love is engineering itself. My favorite projects always end up being the ones with the most complex challenges. I don’t think I could pick just one.

A good recent example is the Olloclip, which is a combination photography app and lens attachment for the iPhone. The main killer feature is real-time barrel distortion correction that made for some very interesting development challenges.

Much like game consoles, working on mobile devices is often about taking a well-understood algorithm and making it work on a platform so small that nobody thinks it will be possible. On AAA games, I used to try and build complex artificial intelligence (AI) systems that ran in 3 ms of frame time. Now I’m trying to cram gigabyte-scale image processing systems into devices with little memory, minimal graphics processing units (GPUs), and slow CPUs. They are similar challenges with completely different contexts. Some days it feels like you’re trying to model high-energy particle physics on a washing machine, but it’s a great when you finally do solve a problem like that. It’s the engineering of the thing that’s exciting, whatever that thing is this week.

Another favorite has been the ICEdot project. It’s a health and safety sensor system that works with your mobile device and is targeted at athletes and coaches. It’s a fun mix of mobile and embedded systems development and it has pushed my skill set into a number of new areas—in particular, Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), which is an exciting new technology. ICEdot is on the bleeding edge of that, and it’s been a big challenge to use it in the real world.

NAN: What types of projects did you work on while you were a Senior Engineer at Pandemic Studios?

QUINN: I started my tenure there on a squad tactics training simulator Pandemic was building for Simulation, Training, and Instrumentation Command (STRICOM), an experimental technology branch of the US Army. It’s a long story, but that simulator was later spun into a series of Xbox games called Full Spectrum Warrior.

The biggest project I worked on was an open-world game set in World War II called Saboteur. Unlike the usual shooter format the WWII genre is littered with, this was a third-person action-adventure game with a noir art style. Saboteur was a hugely ambitious project, and the awesome team there solved some very big challenges. We did things with physics, rendering, AI, clambering, animation, toolchains, content streaming, and game design that no game had done before. As so often happens with AAA games, the marketing budget was pulled at the last moment, so you can add it to the long list of “Greatest Games That Nobody Played.”

NAN: Your blog-style website BlondiHacks features hacking projects involving everything from development boards to two-layer PCB etching. Tell us about the types of projects you enjoy hacking.

QUINN: BlondiHacks is my outlet for whatever whim that comes to mind as far as hacking. I think hacking is more than a hobby—it’s kind of a way of life. It’s about shaping your environment to be what you think it should be. It’s about saving things from landfills and giving new life to forgotten or underappreciated artifacts. It’s part creativity, part environmentalism, part self-reliance, and all good times.

It’s fun to talk about stuff you’re doing, but most of my flights of fancy are so obscure or odd that only a select few would find them interesting. The power of the Internet is that it connects all of us oddballs to each other. Hence, BlondiHacks.

NAN: How did you become interested in technology?

QUINN: I don’t recall a time when I wasn’t interested, honestly, so that transition must have occurred before my brain was retaining memories. What age is that? Three? Four?
I may have been born with a multimeter in my hand (though my mom would probably have noted that in the medical report). My mom likes to say, the day they brought the Apple II into the house (when I was around age five) I crawled up on the stool and haven’t moved since.

To prolong her toothbrush’s life, Quinn replaced a toothbrush battery with a nickel–cadmium battery and added wires to the old battery’s PCB mount points.

NAN: What was your first project?

QUINN: That’s difficult to say, since my life is a series of endless overlapping projects. As soon as I was old enough to hold a soldering iron, I built a lot of things from the seminal Forrest Mims book RadioShack sold. You know the one: Getting Started in Electronics.
That book was my bible for many years. I remember hacking a remote-control truck to have headlights and speed control. I remember building a working guillotine for a school project about the French Revolution. It was 4’ tall and genuinely dangerous. I carried it on the bus and demonstrated it on bourgeoisie bananas in class. I don’t imagine kids would get away with that today.

More recently, my interest in hacking was probably rekindled with the simple act of replacing the “non-user-serviceable” battery in a very expensive toothbrush (see “Toothbrush Repair”). That was five years ago, and I’m still using that toothbrush today. To me, that’s the purest essence of hacking right there—fixing the one weakness in a product that would have otherwise halved its useful life.

Quinn’s homebrew computer, Veronica, includes a clock circuit and a CPU. The breadboard is shown.

NAN:Are you currently working on or planning any projects?

QUINN: My biggest hobby project recently has been my homebrew computer, Veronica (see “Veronica”). The Apple II I mentioned was very formative for me, and [Apple Computer founder] Steve Wozniak was a bit of a hero figure. My whole life, I wanted to know how one person could just sit down and create something like that.

A couple of years ago, with no formal training in electrical engineering, I decided to see if I could do it. Veronica is the result, and it was the fulfillment of a lifelong goal to build a functioning, usable, 8-bit computer from scratch, complete with video graphics array (VGA) bitmapped video, a keyboard, game controllers, and built-in Pong.

Today, my most active project is repairing, restoring, and modifying an early 1990s Bally/Williams pinball machine called Johnny Mnemonic (see “Johnny”). Anyone who likes hacking should be into pinball machines. They are wonderlands of mechanical systems, electronics, software, and game theory all rolled into one. They are also bottomless pits of hacking and tinkering potential (not to mention money pits and time sinks).

Another big ongoing project is our 24 Hours of LeMons race team. The short version is that it’s a (very) low-budget form of endurance auto racing that involves a whole lot of hacking of all kinds. That’s probably an entire interview unto itself, but I feel I should at least mention it, since it’s such a big part of my hacking time.

Quinn is in the process of hacking a Bally/Williams Johnny Mnemonic pinball machine. This photo shows the machine’s circuitry.

NAN:What do you consider to be the “next big thing” in the industry?

QUINN: One “big idea“ that has been put forward that I’m excited about is the notion of hackerspaces replacing public libraries. The Internet is gradually replacing the role of pure information access that libraries have served. It has been suggested that access to high-end technology creation tools is the next such area where playing field leveling is required. Anyone wanting to improve their station in life by executing their ideas in a high-tech world will need access to CNC machines, 3-D printers, machine tools, high-end computer-aided design (CAD), video production software, and so forth.

Libraries are generally well located and already equipped with things such as fire exits, sprinkler systems, and commercial-grade electrical. Converting some libraries into hackerspaces sounds to me like a terrific use of public funds. It’s a bit “pie in the sky,” but places like Edmonton in Alberta, Canada, and North Logan, UT, are already experimenting with the idea. This is like hacking democracy itself, and I love it.

Denhac is a hackerspace on a mission to create and sustain a local, community driven, shared space, that enables education, experimentation, and collaboration, by applying the spirit of DIY to science, technology, engineering, and art.

It’s about 2,500 sq. ft. of commercial/warehouse/workshop space. We have an open shop floor area, bay doors, a classroom, an air-conditioned server room, and floorspace for several workstations specializing in various DIY areas.

Internet radio station (www.denhacradio.org) with a group going for a Low Power FM license (for running a community radio station)

Lots of racks for servers

100 MB Internet

Are there any tools your group really wants or needs?

A metal forge, welding gear, carpentry gear, and CNC Tools.

Does your group work with embedded tech like Arduino, Raspberry Pi, embedded security, or MCU-based designs?

Yes, we teach classes on all of these (and more).

What are some of the projects your group has been working on?

Many and few, lots of individual projects. The group focuses more on collecting great tools for it’s members, and teaching classes on a broad range of topics (from making costumes, to hacking Arduino’s, to synthetic biology DNA hacking with bioblocks).

What’s the craziest project your group or group members have completed?

9′ Tesla coil. Also, a Steampunk flamethrower.

You mentioned a Low Power FM group earlier, can you tell us more about it? Are there other events or initiatives you’d like to talk about?

Yes, we’re just starting up a Low Power FM (LPFM) group that will be applying for a license to set up and run an FM community radio station at Denhac. We started a weekly Kids Coding Dojo class that teaches kids from ages six to fifteen how to code. (Accompanied by their parents.) We have a software defined radio hacking group (Radio Heads) that uses programs like GNUradio with SDR-capable radio kits and dongles to ‘listen in’ on the world. A BIG antenna is needed for that! We have a LockSport group that meets monthly and has some expert lock pickers. We have a 3D and LaserCutter printer group that meets as needed to teach members and the public how to use the equipment and to trade ideas on what to make next.

Show us your hackerspace! Tell us about your group! Where does your group design, hack, create, program, debug, and innovate? Do you work in a 20′ × 20′ space in an old warehouse? Do you share a small space in a university lab? Do you meet a local coffee shop or bar? What sort of electronics projects do you work on? Submit your hackerspace and we might feature you on our website!

In Newcastle upon Tyne, located in North-East England, lies Newcastle Makerspace. This is an eclectic group of makers, creatives, programmers, scientists, and engineers. They’ve set up a space to meet, work, socialize, share ideas and collaborate.

Gregory Fenton is a member and wants to tell us a little bit more about what they’re working on.

Location

18 New Bridge Street West, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 8AW, England

Members

Lots and growing fast.

CW: Tell us about your meeting space.

We have 2 large rooms, one for relaxing, holding meetings and talks etc., and one for working on projects. We also have a fully networked computer room with spare monitors and keyboards for people who bring in their Raspberry Pi. Another room is dedicated to our lathe and laser cutter. There’s a kitchen area so people can prepare meals and make drinks and a well-organized storage rack.

CW: What sort of tools do you have at Makerspace Newcastle?

Oscilloscopes

Soldering stations (including SMD soldering using heat)

Two 3D printers (both working and being built by members)

A lathe

A laser cutter (ordered, just waiting on delivery)

Computers

Bench drills and saws

Circular saws, sanders, grinders, and lots of general hand and power tools

CW: What’s on your wish list?

A laser CNC and newer tables and chairs would be nice additions.

CW: What sort of embedded tech does your group work with?

We use lots of embedded technology such as Arduinos, BeagleBoards, Raspberry Pis, PICs, etc… for various projects.

CW: What are some projects that your group has been working on?

We have so much going on, projects that come to fruition and projects just being imagined that I could go on for ever!

One of our members is building a large quadcopter from scratch with a 3D camera mounted underneath it.

Another is working on a candy machine that feeds the Makers whenever someone tweets to it (give it a try by sending a tweet containing the word candy to @maker_space).

Several of our members are building 3D printers of various styles and sizes.

One of our members designs costumes for shows, circuses and events.

A different member is taking his children’s old baby clothes and making a quilted “memory blanket,” as well as creating wooden toys to give to them now they are a little older.

Some of our junior members are learning about programming, interfacing to electronics and relays, and making toys by hand from balsa wood.

One of our members is creating a power extension that is controlled remotely using Arduinos, servo motors and a GSM shield to switch on and off individual plugs via text message (SMS).

A project that’s being done as a group is a Raspberry Pi media server that plays music and controls other devices such as an amplifier, lights and LED strips. I don’t think this project will ever truly be finished as every completed task leads to “wouldn’t it be cool if we did …”.

What’s the craziest project your group or group members have completed?

Easy. We decided we wanted a laser cutter, went on a members pledge drive and had the money to buy it outright within a week! It is in China at the moment but soon we’ll be cutting out plexiglass and wood like there is no tomorrow!

Do you have any events or initiatives you’d like to tell us about? Where can we learn more about it?

We regularly hold events both in the space itself and in other places in the surrounding area. Check our blog and mailing list from our website for upcoming and past events.

What would you like to say to fellow hackers out there?

Always follow rule zero: Do not be on fire.

Safety is everyone’s responsibility.

Don’t have a space local to you? find a few like minded individuals and set up your own! You can start small (a garage or shed) and expand as time passes and membership increases.

Want to know more about what Makerspace Newcastle does? Check out their Facebook and Twitter page!

Show us your hackerspace! Tell us about your group! Where does your group design, hack, create, program, debug, and innovate? Do you work in a 20′ × 20′ space in an old warehouse? Do you share a small space in a university lab? Do you meet at a local coffee shop or bar? What sort of electronics projects do you work on? Submit your hackerspace and we might feature you on our website!

Makelab Charleston is a hackerspace for hobbyist and professionals who share common interests in technology, computers, science, or digital/electronics art. It provides an environment for people to create anything they can imagine: from electronics, 3D printing, and construction, to networking, and programming.

We started in a 500 sq. ft. garage, but took a step up and are currently renting a 900+ sq. ft. home that’s been renovated. We now have the space for a electronic/soldering room that also has our 3-D printer. One other room is dedicated to power-type tools and our CNC machine that is still being built by our members. The other spaces in the house are used for classes and member activities such as LAN parties.

What tools do you have in your space? (Soldering stations? Oscilloscopes? 3-D printers?)

Soldering stations, oscilloscopes, 3-D printer, power tools, large table-top CNC machine (in progress), and a rack server for the IT minded to play with.

We have members that dabble in multiple areas so we try to provide classes on the technology people want to learn about and explore.

Can you tell us about some of your group’s recent tech projects?

Our most recent tech project has been a overhaul of our server system. Other projects include the CNC currently in progress. That’s been an ongoing project for about a year.

What’s the craziest project your group or group members have completed?

Probably the wackiest project we completed was actually, something not tech related at all, building a bed for Charleston Bed Races. We put together a Lego bed (not real Legos) complete with Lego man and all.

Do you have any events or initiatives you’d like to tell us about? Where can we learn more about it?

Makelab Charleston is about opening the world to information and sharing that information with the people in our community. The best way to do that is through teaching.

Show us your hackerspace! Tell us about your group! Where does your group design, hack, create, program, debug, and innovate? Do you work in a 20′ × 20′ space in an old warehouse? Do you share a small space in a university lab? Do you meet a local coffee shop or bar? What sort of electronics projects do you work on? Submit your hackerspace and we might feature you on our website!

Jean Noël Lefebvre, of Lyon, France, is the inventor of the Ootsidebox touchless technology, an innovative interface that enables adding touchless technology to an existing tablet. (Watch the Elektor.LABS video interview with Lefebvre to find out more about Ootside box and how it works).

Recently, Lefebvre shared with Circuit Cellar photos of his workspace, which he prefers to call his “personal hackerspace” where he conceives inventive ideas and builds them.

Lefebvre’s desk reflects his new project.

His desk has an old oscilloscope, with only two inputs. “I have to upgrade it as soon as possible,” he says.

He is working on a shield for the Arduino UNO board on his desk, which is also where he keeps a Weller soldering iron with specific tools for surface mount devices (SMDs).

“On the screen of the computer you can see the logo of my project Ootsidebox and also the logo of Noisebridge, the San Francisco hackerspace.”

A diverse library

Lefebvre says his library is filled with “a lot of good books (old and modern)” covering many different topics and skills, including electronics, software, signal processing, cryptography, physics, biology, mathematics, and inventors’ biographies.

What is he currently working on in his hackerspace?

“I’m working on my own invention: a touchless gesture user Interface based on electric-fields (E-fields) sensing,” he says. “It’s an open-source and open-hardware project, compatible with the Arduino environment.”

Although Lefebvre is currently working alone in his “personal hackerspace” at his family’s home, his dream is to go to San Francisco, CA, and work out of the well-equipped Noisebridge hackerspace.

A few years ago, he says, big ideas and innovations in technology started in garages. “Today this will take place in hackerspaces, where creativity and technical skills are omnipresent,” he says. “By making stuff in such a place, you are fully connected with a worldwide network of creative people of different backgrounds, and this synergy highly accelerates the innovation process.”

You can view pictures and video Lefebvre posted from his last Noisebridge visit. And you can follow Lefebvre and his work on Twitter.

If you missed the World Maker Faire in New York City, you can pick up Circuit Cellar’s February issue for highlights of the innovative projects and hackers represented there.Veteran electronics DIYer and magazine columnist Jeff Bachiochi is the perfect guide.

“The World Maker Faire is part science fair and part country fair,” Bachiochi says. “Makers are DIYers. The maker movement empowers everyone to build, repair, remake, hack, and adapt all things. The Maker Faire shares the experiences of makers who have been involved in this important process… Social media keeps us in constant contact and can educate, but it can’t replace the feeling you can get from hands-on live interaction with people and the things they have created.

Photo 1: This pole-climbing robot is easy to deploy at a moment’s notice. There is no need for a ladder to get emergency communication antennas up high where they can be most effective.

“It should be noted that not all Maker Faire exhibitors are directly involved with technology. Some non-technological projects on display included the ‘Art Car’ from Pittsburgh, which is an annual revival of an old clunker turned into a drivable art show on wheels. There was also the life-size ‘Mouse Trap’ game, which was quite the contraption and just plain fun, especially if you grew up playing the original game.”

Bachiochi’s article introduces you to a wide variety of innovators, hackers, and hackerspaces.

“The 721st Mechanized Contest Battalion (MCB) is an amateur radio club from Warren County, NJ, that combines amateur (ham) radio with electronics, engineering, mechanics, building, and making,” Bachiochi says. “The club came to the Maker Faire to demonstrate its Emergency Antenna Platform System (E-APS) robot. The robot, which is designed for First Responder Organizations, will turn any parking lot lamppost into an instant antenna tower (see Photo 1).”

The keen and growing interest in 3-D printing as a design tool was evident at the Maker Faire.

“Working by day as an analog/mixed-signal IC design engineer for Cortina Systems in Canada, Andrew Plumb needed a distraction. In the evenings, Plumb uses a MakerBot 3-D printer to create 3-D designs of plastic, like thousands of others experimenting with 3-D printing,” Bachiochi says. “Plumb was not satisfied with simply printing plastic widgets. In fact, he showed me a few of his projects, which include printing plastic onto paper and cloth (see Photo 2).”

Photo 2: Andrew Plumb showed me some unique ideas he was experimenting with using one of his 3-D printers. By printing the structural frame directly on tissue paper, ultra-light parts are practically ready to fly.

Also in the 3-D arena, Bachiochi encountered some innovative new products.

“It was just a matter of time until someone introduced a personal scanner to create digital files of 3-D objects. The MakerBot Digitizer Desktop 3-D Scanner is the first I’ve seen (see Photo 3),” Bachiochi says. “It uses a laser, a turntable, and a CMOS camera to pick off 3-D points and output a STL file. The scanner will create a 3-D image from an object up to 8″ in height and width. There is no third axis scanning, so you must plan your model’s orientation to achieve the best results. Priced less than most 3-D printers, this will be a hot item for 3-D printing enthusiasts.”

Bachiochi’s article includes a lengthy section about “other interesting stuff” and people at the Maker Faire, including the Public Laboratory for Open Technology and Science (Public Lab), a community that uses inexpensive DIY techniques to investigate environmental concerns.

Photo 3: The MakerBot Digitizer Desktop 3-D Scanner is the first production scanner I’ve seen that will directly provide files compatible with the 3-D printing process. (Photo credit: Spencer Higgins)

“For instance, the New York chapter featured two spectrometers, a you-fold-it cardboard version and a near-infrared USB camera-based kit,” Bachiochi says. “This community of educators, technologists, scientists, and community organizers believes they can promote action, intervention, and awareness through a participatory research model in which you can play a part.”

At this family-friendly event, Bachiochi met a family that “creates” together.

“Asheville, NC-based Beatty Robotics is not your average robotics company,” Bachiochi says. “The Beatty team is a family that likes to share fun robotic projects with friends, family, and other roboticists around the world. The team consists of Dad (Robert) and daughters Camille ‘Lunamoth’ and Genevieve ‘Julajay.’ The girls have been mentored in electronics, software programming, and workshop machining. They do some unbelievable work (see Photo 4). Everyone has a hand in designing, building, and programming their fleet of robots. The Hall of Science is home to one of their robots, the Mars Rover.”

There is much more in Bachiochi’s five-page look at the Maker Faire, including resources for finding and participating in a hackerspace community. The February issue including Bachiochi’s articles is available for membership download or single-issue purchase.

Photo 4: Beatty Robotics is a family of makers that produces some incredible models. Young Camille Beatty handles the soldering, but is also well-versed in machining and other areas of expertise.

Scott Garman is more than just a Linux software engineer. He is also heavily involved with the Yocto Project, an open-source collaboration that provides tools for the embedded Linux industry. In 2013, Scott helped Intel launch the MinnowBoard, the company’s first open-hardware SBC. —Nan Price, Associate Editor

Scott Garman

NAN: Describe your current position at Intel. What types of projects have you developed?

SCOTT: I’ve worked at Intel’s Open Source Technology Center for just about four years. I began as an embedded Linux software engineer working on the Yocto Project and within the last year, I moved into a technical evangelism role representing Intel’s involvement with the MinnowBoard.

Before working at Intel, my background was in developing audio products based on embedded Linux for both consumer and industrial markets. I also started my career as a Linux system administrator in academic computing for a particle physics group.

Scott was involved with an Intel MinnowBoard robotics and computer vision demo, which took place at LinuxCon Japan in May 2013.

I’m definitely a generalist when it comes to working with Linux. I tend to bounce around between things that don’t always get the attention they need, whether it is security, developer training, or community outreach.

More specifically, I’ve developed and maintained parallel computing clusters, created sound-level management systems used at concert stadiums, worked on multi-room home audio media servers and touchscreen control systems, dug into the dark areas of the Autotools and embedded Linux build systems, and developed fun conference demos involving robotics and computer vision. I feel very fortunate to be involved with embedded Linux at this point in history—these are very exciting times!

Scott is shown working on an Intel MinnowBoard demo, which was built around an OWI Robotic Arm.

NAN: Can you tell us a little more about your involvement with the Yocto Project (www.yoctoproject.org)?

SCOTT: The Yocto Project is an effort to reduce the amount of fragmentation in the embedded Linux industry. It is centered on the OpenEmbedded build system, which offers a tremendous amount of flexibility in how you can create embedded Linux distros. It gives you the ability to customize nearly every policy of your embedded Linux system, such as which compiler optimizations you want or which binary package format you need to use. Its killer feature is a layer-based architecture that makes it easy to reuse your code to develop embedded applications that can run on multiple hardware platforms by just swapping out the board support package (BSP) layer and issuing a rebuild command.

New releases of the build system come out twice a year, in April and October.

Here, the OWI Robotic Arm is being assembled.

I’ve maintained various user space recipes (i.e., software components) within OpenEmbedded (e.g., sudo, openssh, etc.). I’ve also made various improvements to our emulation environment, which enables you to run QEMU and test your Linux images without having to install it on hardware.

I created the first version of a security tracking system to monitor Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) reports that are relevant to recipes we maintain. I also developed training materials for new developers getting started with the Yocto Project, including a very popular introductory screencast “Getting Started with the Yocto Project—New Developer Screencast Tutorial”

SCOTT: The MinnowBoard is based on Intel’s Queens Bay platform, which pairs a Tunnel Creek Atom CPU (the E640 running at 1 GHz) with the Topcliff Platform controller hub. The board has 1 GB of RAM and includes PCI Express, which powers our SATA disk support and gigabit Ethernet. It’s an SBC that’s well suited for embedded applications that can use that extra CPU and especially I/O performance.

Scott doesn’t have a dedicated workbench or garage. He says he tends to just clear off his desk, lay down some cardboard, and work on things such as the Trippy RGB Waves Kit, which is shown.

The MinnowBoard also has the embedded bus standards you’d expect, including GPIO, I2C, SPI, and even CAN (used in automotive applications) support. We have an expansion connector on the board where we route these buses, as well as two lanes of PCI Express for custom high-speed I/O expansion.

There are countless things you can do with MinnowBoard, but I’ve found it is especially well suited for projects where you want to combine embedded hardware with computing applications that benefit from higher performance (e.g., robots that use computer vision, as a central hub for home automation projects, networked video streaming appliances, etc.).

And of course it’s open hardware, which means the schematics, Gerber files, and other design files are available under a Creative Commons license. This makes it attractive for companies that want to customize the board for a commercial product; educational environments, where students can learn how boards like this are designed; or for those who want an open environment to interface their hardware projects.

I created a MinnowBoard embedded Linux board demo involving an OWI Robotic Arm. You can watch a YouTube video to see how it works.

NAN: What compelled Intel to make the MinnowBoard open hardware?

SCOTT: The main motivation for the MinnowBoard was to create an affordable Atom-based development platform for the Yocto Project. We also felt it was a great opportunity to try to release the board’s design as open hardware. It was exciting to be part of this, because the MinnowBoard is the first Atom-based embedded board to be released as open hardware and reach the market in volume.

Open hardware enables our customers to take the design and build on it in ways we couldn’t anticipate. It’s a concept that is gaining traction within Intel, as can be seen with the announcement of Intel’s open-hardware Galileo project.

NAN: What types of personal projects are you working on?

SCOTT: I’ve recently gone on an electronics kit-building binge. Just getting some practice again with my soldering iron with a well-paced project is a meditative and restorative activity for me.

Scott’s Blinky POV Kit is shown. “I don’t know what I’d do without my PanaVise Jr. [vise] and some alligator clips,” he said.

I worked on one project, the Trippy RGB Waves Kit, which includes an RGB LED and is controlled by a microcontroller. It also has an IR sensor that is intended to detect when you wave your hand over it. This can be used to trigger some behavior of the RGB LED (e.g., cycling the colors). Another project, the Blinky POV Kit, is a row of LEDs that can be programmed to create simple text or logos when you wave the device around, using image persistence.

Below is a completed JeeNode v6 Kit Scott built one weekend.

My current project is to add some wireless sensors around my home, including temperature sensors and a homebrew security system to monitor when doors get opened using 915-MHz JeeNodes. The JeeNode is a microcontroller paired with a low-power RF transceiver, which is useful for home-automation projects and sensor networks. Of course the central server for collating and reporting sensor data will be a MinnowBoard.

NAN: Tell us about your involvement in the Portland, OR, open-source developer community.

SCOTT: Portland has an amazing community of open-source developers. There is an especially strong community of web application developers, but more people are hacking on hardware nowadays, too. It’s a very social community and we have multiple nights per week where you can show up at a bar and hack on things with people.

This photo was taken in the Open Source Bridge hacker lounge, where people socialize and collaborate on projects. Here someone brought a brainwave-control game. The players are wearing electroencephalography (EEG) readers, which are strapped to their heads. The goal of the game is to use biofeedback to move the floating ball to your opponent’s side of the board.

I’d say it’s a novelty if I wasn’t so used to it already—walking into a bar or coffee shop and joining a cluster of friendly people, all with their laptops open. We have coworking spaces, such as Collective Agency, and hackerspaces, such as BrainSilo and Flux (a hackerspace focused on creating a welcoming space for women).

Take a look at Calagator to catch a glimpse of all the open-source and entrepreneurial activity going on in Portland. There are often multiple events going on every night of the week. Calagator itself is a Ruby on Rails application that was frequently developed at the bar gatherings I referred to earlier. We also have technical conferences ranging from the professional OSCON to the more grassroots and intimate Open Source Bridge.

I would unequivocally state that moving to Portland was one of the best things I did for developing a career working with open-source technologies, and in my case, on open-source projects.

DEVEN: We currently have two locations. One in Salt Lake City, UT and one in Orem, UT.

Our Salt Lake City location is about 1,000 sq ft in a nice office building. We have one main area and two smaller rooms.

Our Orem location is about 5,700 sq ft in a large warehouse that also has offices. We have sectioned off a wood shop, a metal shop, a clean CNC, an assembly area, a members desks area, a lounge, a server room, an electronics room, and a few other dedicated areas.

ROBBERT: What tools do you have in your space? (Soldering stations? Oscilloscopes? 3-D printers?)

DEVEN: Too many things to list. All the general things you would expect, such as:

Soldering irons

Oscilloscopes

Analyzers

PCB work stations

Laser cutter

Vinyl cutter

Heat press

Chop saws

Mini lathe

Servers

Air tools

Cut-off saws

Mig welder

V90 FireBall router

A couple small miscellaneous CNC routers

3-D printers

Networking gear

ROBBERT: Are there any tools your group really wants or needs?

DEVEN: We would love to have a large mill (CNC or manual) some day. Also, just all-around upgrades to current equipment.

ROBBERT: Can you tell us about some of your group’s recent tech projects?

DEVEN: Currently we are working on miniature MAME cabinets. They are two player and will hold up to a 22″ LCD. We will release the CNC plans to the public as soon as we are done.

We’re working on a lot of miscellaneous projects: software, hardware, security, and so forth.

We’re also currently working on building some displays for The Living Planet Aquarium, in Sandy UT.

ROBBERT: What’s the craziest project your group or group members have completed?

DEVEN: Nothing too crazy. We built a drink cooler a year or so ago for the Red Bull Challenge. We designed and build a few full-size four-player MAME cabinets (planned for release to the public on our website, and featured in J. Baichtal’s Hack This: 24 Incredible Hackerspace Projects from the DIY Movement (Que Publishing, 2011).

4-player MAME cabinet

ROBBERT: Do you have any events or initiatives you’d like to tell us about? Where can we learn more about it?

DEVEN: Lots of things are going on right now. Nothing specific, aside from working with the aquarium. We have a lot of public events/user groups that meet at our space. Our calender is on our website if you are interested in specifics.

ROBBERT: What would you like to say to fellow hackers out there?

DEVEN: Have fun, be productive, be safe.

Want to learn more about The Transistor? Check out their Facebook or MeetUp page!

Show us your hackerspace! Tell us about your group! Where does your group design, hack, create, program, debug, and innovate? Do you work in a 20′ × 20′ space in an old warehouse? Do you share a small space in a university lab? Do you meet a local coffee shop or bar? What sort of electronics projects do you work on? Submit your hackerspace and we might feature you on our website!

From his grade-school Atari obsession and his teenage involvement in the L0pht Heavy Industries hacker group, to co-hosting Discovery Channel’s Prototype This! and starting his own company, Grand Idea Studio, Joe Grand has always maintained his passion for engineering. Joe and I recently discussed his journey and his lifelong love of all things engineering.—Nan Price, Associate Editor

NAN: Give us some background information. When and how did you discover electronics. What was your first project?

Joe Grand

JOE: I got involved with computers and electronics in 1982, when I was 7 years old. My first system was an Atari 400 computer, an Atari 810 floppy disk drive, and an Atari 830 acoustic coupler modem. I spent every waking hour playing computer games, trying to write my own programs, and connecting to local bulletin board systems. I was continually experimenting and questioning. I remember learning hexadecimal by poking around with a binary editor and figuring out how to replace names on game title screens with my own.
My brother, who is six years older than me, was also interested in computers and electronics. He would repair audio equipment, build telephone and computer gadgets, and disassemble broken electronics to scavenge them for parts. He had a cabinet that served as a junk bin for components and broken boards. When I did chores for him, like doing his laundry or cleaning his room, he’d let me pick something from the cabinet.

I was 13 years old when I hand-etched my first circuit board to make a “ring-busy device.” The device was simply a resistor across the tip and ring of the telephone line that had an RJ-11 plug for easy insertion/removal. It would make the telephone switch at the central office believe your phone was off the hook (thus, providing a busy signal to any incoming caller), but would still enable you to make outgoing calls. It was a fun, mischievous device, but also very practical to prevent annoying phone calls during dinner.

Right from the start, I had a strong emotional connection to all things electronic. I could just understand how technology was working even if I was unable to explain why. I knew early on that I wanted to be an electrical engineer. I wore this proudly on my sleeve, which didn’t help my ranking in the social hierarchy of elementary school!

NAN: What have been some of your influences?

JOE: In the early 1990s, when I was still a teenager, I joined a group called L0pht Heavy Industries (pronounced “loft” and spelled ell-zero-ph-t, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L0pht). The L0pht was a clubhouse for Boston-area hackers who had met on local bulletin board systems and it was one of the first publicly known “hackerspaces.” The L0pht simply started as a place to store computer equipment, tinker with technology, and hang out, but it ended up as seven close-knit friends changing the face of computer security vulnerability research and disclosure.

We would examine networks, software applications, and hardware products for security flaws. If we discovered a vulnerability, we would challenge the vendor to not only acknowledge the problem, but to fix it. This is now common practice, but back then, it was a feat practically unheard of.

I looked up to the other guys in the group. All were at least six years older than me and they became my mentors (whether they knew it or not) for nearly the next decade. They helped me to focus my energy on projects that would have positive impacts for other people. They also helped reinforce the hacker mindset—that is, not being afraid to try unconventional solutions to problems, pushing the limits of technology, being dedicated to learning through constant experimentation, and sharing my passion with others. Being involved in the L0pht was a very special time for me and shaped much of how I view the world.

NAN: You grew up and went to school in Boston. How did you end up in California?

JOE: Being in Boston for nearly 28 years left me with a lot of history (both good and bad). Everywhere I looked, I had a story, a feeling, or a connection to a time or event. I needed a clean slate. I had just left @stake, a computer security consulting firm that we started out of the L0pht, and my wife (girlfriend at the time) had just finished graduate school. She was also looking for new adventures, so we packed up our stuff and drove across the country not really knowing what we were going to do when we got to California. We lived in San Diego for a few years and ultimately settled in San Francisco when I started work on Discovery Channel’s Prototype This! television show.

San Francisco was a natural fit for us, and when the show ended, we decided to stay. Being close to Silicon Valley and its electronics stores (e.g., Jameco Electronics, WeirdStuff Warehouse, and HSC Electronic Supply) is quite useful, and I always get a thrill driving by the offices of chip vendors I use on a daily basis.

NAN: You started your own product design firm, Grand Idea Studio, in 2002. Tell us about the company.

JOE: Grand Idea Studio (www.grandideastudio.com) is a product design and licensing firm specializing in consumer/household devices and modules for electronics hobbyists. I started the company to create an environment that suited me best and would enable me to focus on what I loved to do. The majority of my work stems from ideas developed in-house or with my industrial design/mechanical engineering partners. I prefer to design simple, effective devices that serve a specific purpose. I’m all for using technology—but only where it’s needed—to make a product better.

Much of my time is spent building prototypes or proof-of-concepts of ideas (though many of those don’t ever see the light of day) that are sold and/or licensed to suitable partners. Some projects I’ll release as open source (usually through a Creative Commons Attribution license), so others can learn from my experiences and build upon my work to make something better.

I also teach a hardware hacking course at public and private events (www.grandideastudio.com/portfolio/hardware-hacking-training). The course focuses on teaching board-level hardware hacking and reverse-engineering techniques and skills. It’s a combination of a lecture and hands-on exercises covering the hardware hacking process, proper use of tools and test measurement equipment, circuit board analysis and modification, embedded security, and common hardware attack vectors. The course concludes with a final hardware hacking challenge in which students must apply what they’ve learned to defeat the security mechanism of a custom circuit board. Design engineers and computer security researchers don’t often join forces. Being both, I feel like it’s part of my responsibility to help make that connection.

JOE: My most relevant and memorable engineering experience was when I worked for Continuum (formerly Design Continuum, www.continuuminnovation.com), a design and innovation consultancy based in West Newton, MA. I had worked on and off at the company during college and took a full-time engineering position in 1998. I was one of only two electrical engineers. We worked very closely with industrial designers, mechanical engineers, manufacturers, and clients to create innovative new products. Some key projects I contributed to were the A.T. Cross iPen (an early digital writing tablet) and the FluidSense FS-01 portable infusion pump (voted one of the best inventions of 2000 by Time magazine). It was during my time at Continuum that I learned about the product development and production manufacturing processes and sharpened my skills as an engineer.

NAN: Tell us about your experience working on Discovery Channel’s Prototype This! television show. Do you have a favorite project?

Prototype This! Giant Boxing Robot

JOE: Prototype This! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prototype_This!) was a short-lived engineering entertainment show that followed the real-life design process of a unique prototype each episode. Although we only filmed for one season (comprising 13 episodes), the show gained a “cult” status of sorts among engineers and makers. It aired on Discovery Channel in the US in late 2008, but is now airing elsewhere throughout the world. The show is also available on Netflix, making it accessible to viewers who may have missed the show the first time around.

To be clear, I’m an engineer to the core, and I never had any intention of being in front of a camera as part of my job. But, the opportunity to show off engineering to the world in a way that was fun, entertaining, and somewhat educational seemed too good to pass up. Producing the show turned out to be a difficult and frustrating process, as we not only had to be on-screen television hosts trying to convey complex, technical builds in a way most viewers would understand, but we also had to actually engineer, design, build, and test the prototypes.

Prototype This! The PyroPack

We ended up building ridiculously crazy contraptions including “Mind Controlled Car” (Episode 1), giant 10’ “Boxing Robots” (Episode 2), and a “Traffic Busting Truck” that could elevate itself over other traffic and move in any direction (Episode 3). Each build had its own special flavor and design challenges and I actually enjoyed working on all of them. From an engineering point of view, I was most proud of the AirTrax control system (Episode 3), the PyroPack (Episode 6: “Robotic Firefighter Assistant”), and the underwater ROV controller (Episode 10: “Virtual Sea Adventure”). All of the documentation for my contributions to the builds, including schematics, source code, and development notes, is available at www.grandideastudio.com/prototype-this.

Ultimately, the show proved to be unsustainable (from financial and time perspectives), but it was an unforgettable experience. The best thing is how the show continues to inspire future engineers. Nearly every day I receive e-mails from viewers asking for details about a particular build or what it takes to become an engineer, and I do my best to point them in the right direction.

NAN: You’ve designed dozens of things—from computer memory-imaging tools to children’s products to medical devices. Tell us about your design process. Do you have a favorite project?

JOE: I think my design process is very typical. I start by identifying and sourcing key components for the project. I’ll put together a preliminary block diagram and then build a proof-of-concept or prototype using a breadboard or PCB (depending on complexity and/or other constraints).

If the design is an embedded system that requires firmware, I’ll start writing it as soon as the prototype hardware is ready. This lets me validate that each hardware subsystem behaves as required and, if necessary, I can easily make changes to the design.

Once the hardware design has been sufficiently proven, I’ll move to a production design and form factor. Then, I’ll finish up the firmware, refine my documentation (which I work on throughout the process), and either release the design or move to production. If things go wrong, which they can sometimes do, then I may make multiple iterations of a design before it’s ready for production.

When I’m in the throes of the design process, I’m obsessed with the work. I think about it constantly—on my daily runs, in the shower, at bedtime, and sometimes while sleeping. I try to anticipate worst-case scenarios, component tolerances, failure modes, and how the end user will interact with the device (both correctly and incorrectly).

Every project I work on is currently my favorite and each project comes with its own challenges, successes, and failures. As soon as I’m done with one project, I’m looking for the next thing to do.

DEFCON 17 Badge

I’m particularly fond of my work on the DEF CON badges. Held every summer, DEF CON (www.defcon.org) is the largest and oldest continuously running hacker event of its kind. It’s a mix of good guys, bad guys, government officials, and everyone in between, all having fun, sharing information, seeing old friends, and learning new things.

For five years (2006–2010) I had the honor of designing the official conference badges, which were artistic, fully functional electronic devices. I believe we were the first large-scale event to provide electronic badges to attendees. It changed what people have come to expect from a conference badge. The challenge was to create something that scrutinizing hackers would enjoy, appreciate, play with, and modify, while staying within the budget (around $10 per badge in 10,000-unit quantities).

Full details about the badges, along with schematics, source code, pictures, attendee hacks, and related articles, are available at www.grandideastudio.com/portfolio/defcon-x-badge (where x = 14, 15, 16, 17, 18).

NAN: Are you currently working on or planning any projects? Can you tell us about them?

JOE: There will (hopefully) never be a shortage of cool projects to work on. I like to keep multiple plates spinning at one time, though I can only talk about some of those plates.
At the recent 2013 DESIGN West conference, I released the JTAGulator (http://jtagulator.com), which is an open-source, Parallax Propeller-based hardware tool that assists in identifying on-chip debug (OCD) and/or programming connections from test points, vias, or component pads on a target device. Discovering available interfaces is a common step in hardware hacking or reverse engineering, as they are usually left unprotected and can be used to extract memory or affect the state of a system on the fly.
A few similar tools exist, but they are either incomplete, closed source, or proof of concept. I wanted to create something that could be used in actual, real-world situations and that would help new people get involved in hardware hacking. The tool will also help to highlight the insecurity of leaving OCD interfaces enabled in production devices and hopefully serve as a catalyst for change in the engineering community (where convenience often trumps security). The JTAGulator currently supports JTAG and I will be making continued refinements to the firmware to add support for additional OCD protocols.

Last year, I finished up the Emic 2 Text-to-Speech module (www.grandideastudio.com/portfolio/emic-2-text-to-speech-module), which has just started to appear in lots of interesting projects. The module is a self-contained, multi-language voice synthesizer that converts a stream of digital text into natural-sounding speech. It’s based on the Epson S1V30120 text-to-speech (TTS) IC, which uses the familiar DECtalk engine and is easy to interface to any microcontroller through a standard serial interface. Though embedded speech synthesis has been around for a while, there was no small form factor, low-cost solution readily available. So, I made one. A search for “Emic 2” on YouTube will result in various projects that use the module, including a tweet reader, a color-to-voice converter, a talking thermometer, an interaction with Apple’s Siri, and some singing demonstrations.

Some other projects I have planned include experimenting with PCB reverse-engineering techniques, hacking with a BeagleBone Black and OpenCV, and designing a new RFID system.

NAN: What do you consider to be the “next big thing” in the embedded design industry?

JOE: I’ve been increasingly concerned with the improper and (sometimes) socially unacceptable use of technology. From cameras at every street corner to mobile devices tracking your every move to Facebook and Google (among others) controlling your personal data, privacy has become something we’re slowly (and willingly?) losing. It’s a slippery slope that I don’t think many people will notice until it’s too late. The problem is largely driven by our society’s mass adoption of technology and taking that technology for granted. As an engineer and hacker, I strive to educate others about the unintended consequences of blindly using technology and hope it will make them more aware.

ALTSpace is a Community Art Workshop in Seattle. Creative people of all kinds share this spacious workshop, teaching, experimenting, making and learning. Members can spend time bouncing ideas off one another, hold or attend classes, work away from home and have the space to get even large projects done.

Co-founder Mike tells us about his space:Tell us about your meeting space!

We have a total of about 2800 sq ft. We have two garage spaces for industrial machines, loud and dirty operations. (about 700 sq ft total) The rest of the space is for personal workspaces and public areas for working, meeting, hanging out. We have 2 showers, 2 bathrooms, a kitchen, a laundry room and an outdoor patio.

What tools do you have in your space? (Soldering stations? Oscilloscopes? 3-D printers?)

Yes, we do quite a bit of electronics. One of our more well known projects, the Groovik’s Cube (A 30ft playable Rubik’s Cube) is an arduino driven project.

Can you tell us about some of your group’s recent tech projects?

Groovik’s Cube:

We first built the cube as an art project for Burning Man 2009 and we’ve since been working hard to try and bring this project to the general public. We’ve been collaborating with the Science Center since summer ’10 and we’ve been doing a number of refurbishments including a brand new light-weight aluminum structure to create a neater look suitable for an indoor museum environment.

Groovik’s cube is a fully playable, LED driven Rubik’s cube, hung from the ceiling, corner down. (the motion is of course simulated, not mechanical, i.e. the colors move around, not the structure itself). It can be played and solved by the visitors. A particularly interesting feature is that we have split the controls into 3 stations placed around the cube, each allowing only one axis of rotation. This means 3 people have to collaborate together to solve it. The stations are ~30-50 ft apart from each other. This makes the puzzle considerably harder with a current record solution time of 50 minutes (achieved on Friday night @ Burning Man 09). It also turns a very introverted game into a collaborative challenge which is fun to watch. Imagine people shouting instructions to each other and running around checking on the state of the cube from different angles.

Temple of Shame:

by Alissa Mortenson, Nebunele Theatre, The Temple of Shame was a 6ft wide, 18ft tall wooden Temple dedicated to the collection of shame from the participants of Black Rock City. The temple was ceremonially burned on the last night of the festival to symbolically release all the shame collected.

From shameproject.org: “The experience of shame is part of our shared humanity, yet paradoxically, the times when we are ashamed are the times when we feel most alone. But within shame lies a capacity for human connection. The Shame Bearers seek to explore this emotion as a powerful medium for reaching a state of shared vulnerability. In order to make connection –the core human desire– we must believe that we are enough, that we are worthy of love and acceptance. In our vulnerability and our recognition of our mutual imperfections, we can find worthiness and connection. That is the power of this project.”

What’s the craziest project your group or group members have completed?

Groovik’s cube for sure.

Do you have any events or initiatives you’d like to tell us about? Where can we learn more about it?

Indeed: http://lsc.org/grooviks. We’re trying to raise funding for a new Groovik’s cube that will travel the World for 7 years together with Liberty Science Center and Erno Rubik!

What would you like to say to fellow hackers out there?

Hack more! Not satified with availability of hackerspaces near you ? Start one! It’s easier than you think and people come out of the woodwork to come and help and donate time and tools.

Show us your hackerspace! Tell us about your group! Where does your group design, hack, create, program, debug, and innovate? Do you work in a 20′ × 20′ space in an old warehouse? Do you share a small space in a university lab? Do you meet at a local coffee shop or bar? What sort of electronics projects do you work on? Submit your hackerspace and we might feature you on our website!